Tuesday, June 17, 2008

I always dread posting about Keith Olbermann because of the Politics debate that ensues, but hopefully we can all just laugh at him for this one. You'd think that someone who was once an ESPN Sports Center anchor and a current Sports analyst on NBC (even though it's Football) might know where a Basketball playerlike Chauncey Billups plays, but alas he does not.

Chauncey is introducing Barack Obama during a rally in Detroit for Gore's endorsement of the Senator last night and Keith doesn't seem to know which team the Point Guard plays for. He tries to go to the well (his notes) to find Billups' squad, but that doesn't exactly work for him....

Currently, was, recently, is...ummm yeah. Come on Keith. I know you still watch Sports and the guy has been with the Pistons for the last six years. The last time he played for the Nuggets was in 2000. Hell he played more games for Minnesota than he did for Denver!

I bet whoever typed up his notes doesn't know how to read an NBA stat sheet. Too funny.

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Comments:

Under circumstances like this -- a live event intruding on a pretty tightly-formatted show -- you'd expect KO's producers to give a little help. MSNBC had been planning to run this event live; didn't they have someone on-scene who had the speakers' list? Couldn't that person notify KO's producers, so they could whisper it in his ear or type a message on the computer screen he probably has under the surface of his desk? There are ways of handling this without expecting the host to tap-dance,and Countdown's production staff failed.

He was stumbling for the right words, forgot briefly for a second, said Detroit after fumbling for what he wanted to say. Guess what? It happens. It's live tv.

These things happen from time to time: You got a producer in your ear, you're not completely sure what you're seeing on live tv, and you say something that's a tad off. He watches sports all the time, I'm sure he knows Billups is a Piston, but he made a slight error. VERY slight.

I think KO knows what team Billups plays for, but whatever Harvard lackey intern was typing his notes cut and pasted the wrong info from Wikipedia, leaving Keith to stumble when he KNEW he was reading wrong info. I'm sure we can all reminisce about our live TV broadcasts and how we got the simple stuff wrong while helping Americans actually think about the news instead of regurgitating FOX Noise bumper sticker comments...

I suppose you'd think anyone that followed sports at all would know Billups was on the Pistons, but it's really no surprise that millions of hard core sports fans and thinking people refuse to touch the NBA at all, knowing it's a boring, sad league. Like me! Way to go Keith. I like him more every day.

To hollywood wags: I'm actually somewhat offended by what you said because I am a lefty (and a big Keith Olbermann fan) and I do enjoy organized sports.

That being said, the one organized sport I don't watch is the NBA and if you asked me who Chauncey Billups played for, I probably would have to think for a few seconds (of course I know now after reading AA's post, but I'm talking about before). My guess is is that he was not made aware of the fact that Billups was speaking before Al Gore and was given all the information by his producers as he was chatting with Dana Milbank, thus making it very easy to misunderstand or misinterpret something.

According to Keith, when he mentioned Chauncey Billups, for whatever reason he did not give, he said he played for Denver. But he was not talking about the Denver Nuggets, he was talking about the Denver Jellymakers, who went out of business in 1946. The team was a part of an old basketball league called the AAU. Why he was thinking that is anyone's guess. But instead of getting into a 50 comment debate about KO, let's all just laugh the whole thing off and ponder this question. Who in their right mind would name their team "Jellymakers"?

So Keith Olbermann really thought that Billups plays for the "Denver Jellymakers?" "An AAU team that folded in 1946?" I know that KO is known for a sense of humor, but that was, as the hip teenagers say, "lame to the max fer sure!" At best, it was CYA.

As for the part about live TV, the rally at which Gore endorsed Obama ran over an hour behind schedule. I even think that MSNBC cancelled a taped interview with Luke Russert, son of the late Tim Russert, because of the long delay.

Oh, and it was at Joe Louis Arena. Home of the Red Wings of the NHL. And believe me, he wouldn't have messed that up if Billups had played for them.

This thread is ridiculous. Anyone who knows anything about Keith Olbermann knows that baseball is his true love. Do we really expect him to recognize the face and current team of every professional athlete in every big sport in America? How many would that be?At least he recognized his Chauncey's face. I wouldn't have been able to pick him out in a lineup.

Olbermann is a mean-spirited political hack. He has no place on Sunday night football. If anyone ever tries to talk politics with me at the football stadium (either pro or con), I always shut them down.

I may organize a campaign against NBC to remove Olbermann from Sunday Night football. It is really a slap in the face of the average fan. I watch football to escpae from politics, bills, etc . .